Spring Break in Chicago

I came back from spending Spring Break in Chicago. A more normal person would go to somewhere like New Orleans with the parties or Florida with all of the beaches, but I'm a theatre-minded guy so none of the partygoers would let me in.

I stayed at the J. Ira and Nicki Harris Family Hostel for the whole week. It's a really big place in the Downtown area, and it's surprisingly close to everything I needed out of a city: a library across State, a diner right by Michigan Ave., and a church if I climb up to Madison.

Most of the time, I see Chicago as a big Edward Hopper painting. The city is a lot less crowded than New York City, and people are scattered farther from each other. The view from the hostel (with the college buildings all over the south of the Loop) is just that, buildings. You'll see the occasional guy waiting outside surrounded by the lines, the columns, the windows.

I told a lot of people in the hostel that I wanted to go to a couple of cabarets in the city, and I want someone to come with me. Unfortunately, nobody watned to go. I went to a piano bar on North Halsted, and one of the hostellers told me that it's part of the city inhabited by gay folks. As long as a good cabaret artist (Sammy Goldstein was playing showtunes all night) is doing a show there, I'm going. Davenport's Piano Bar and Cabaret is my favorite place because it reminded me of the clubs I've been to in New York. Besides, Karen Mason is doing a show there in May 9th.

I toured a couple of the museums in the city. I went out as far as Oak Park to see Frank Lloyd Wright's home and studio. I think the best weather to see Wright's home is during a light rain because it completes the image of the home being built around nature. I bought a couple of postcards and mailed them off to a few noders and friends.

I planned a get-together for noders around Chicago, but nobody came. Instead, I went back to the hostel only to find a message from Stylee telling me to go to a party. I had a few drinks, and for the first time, I had some whisky that went went down pretty good. No, I didn't get laid or anything.

I could've come back to Chicago at May 5th if it weren't for the price of doing so. I saw an ad for Ute Lemper doing a show in the Fairmont Hotel, and a ticket for that show was $350. I don't think they sell student tickets.